a thousand suns
by xfucktheglasses
Summary: Picture me broken. —SasuSaku.


**a thousand suns**

He crawled into her apartment, through the window.

It was pouring outside. The kind of pouring that obscured everything from your vision; the kind of pouring that soaked you to the bone in a matter of milliseconds. It was around two in the morning, he figured, but he didn't care about the time; he didn't care about anything but the blood that was trailing him like a shadow.

He groaned, softly, as he dragged himself to a hard surface, trying to bring himself back up to his feet. He bumped his shoulder against something – a bookcase, maybe – and he groaned, again, swaying in his stance and slamming himself against the wall as his means of staying upright.

He walked towards her room, in the darkness, leaning against the wall and softly humming in tune with the pit-patting of his blood dripping down on the floorboards.

His hand slipped against the knob of her room, but the door opened anyway and he slipped inside, stumbling and vision going blurry. He grunted, and dropped to his knees, his drenched hair slapping at his face with the momentum and force of his fall.

"What—_oh my god_!"

The night-lamp at her little bed-stand turned on and fought with all its might to illuminate the darkness. She was up on her feet, half naked and disoriented, pink hair tickling her neck as she ran to his side. "Sasuke! Oh my god, Sasuke, what _happened_?"

He didn't say anything; merely coughed out blood and sunk into her embrace.

"Sasuke," she hissed, almost sobbing, "what's going on – Sasuke… oh my god…"

He felt her as she fingered his soaked back – blood and water, he knew. That's what was had him so drenched.

"Sasuke," she whispered, sobbing, "…What happened to your back?"

He groaned, again, and grabbed at her forearm, raising his upper body up to lock his eyes with hers. "Sakura…" he coughed, again, "in seven days… In seven days the world is going to burn…"

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She stood over the grave, umbrella doing absolutely nothing to shield her from the unmerciful downpour. Her eyes were clouded and rimmed with tears, red lips trembling with the exhaustion from keeping sobs in.

Sakura couldn't bear to look at the carvings of the grave; couldn't bear to look away, either.

"Oh," she finally breathed out, shakily, "Oh, Sasuke…"

She hugged herself and bit at her lip, tears spilling and resolve breaking.

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Staying in her apartment was brutal; she realized on the _third_ night of no sleep, no eating, no _breathing_ that she couldn't really stay there any longer.

In the middle of the nth night of nonstop raining, in the darkness that threatened to swallow her whole, she hastily packed a bag of clothing and ran out of her apartment in need of a new shelter. But where could she go? She couldn't go to Hinata's – she couldn't go to Sai's… She couldn't go anywhere but…

…But to Karin's place.

Yes.

Karin.

Sasuke's… his sister.

Yes.

She slipped into her car and drove as recklessly as possible, not at all minding that she was putting her life on the line. She stopped the car in the middle of the street and ran to Karin's small house. The door was opened; as if she had been waited for. Sakura didn't pay any mind to it as she slipped inside, excessive water from the rain dripping onto the floor.

"K-Karin…?"

Something was lit with a lighter and Karin appeared, slowly walking down the stairs, a lit cigarette in between her lips. Her red hair was a mess and her glasses were slipping down her nose and she was wearing a shirt that didn't really belong to her, a sane (or insane) part of Sakura's mind mused as she stared at the light-blue of the button-up shirt that loosely draped the girl's body.

"Sakura," she said, empty smirk on her lips. "Hello."

Sakura walked to her and curved herself to fit every of the taller girl's angles. "I…I just… I just…"

"You were the last to see my brother, huh," she murmured, loosely throwing an arm around Sakura. "S'okay; he always liked you best, anyway."

Sakura swallowed thickly.

"Did he say anything to you?"

Karin was leading her back upstairs, her cig gingerly being held by the tips of her forefinger and her thumb. Sakura counted every shape and pattern the wooden floors made. Her head hurt, and she'd probably catch a cold, soon, but she didn't seem to care because Sasuke was dead and she was being led to a bedroom by his sister.

"…He… He was hurt," she whispered. "He was bleeding from his back… He—"

"What did he _say_," Karin pressed on, poking the tip of her finger at Sakura's chest and dropping her to the bed. She took the cigarette in between her lips and twirled around, making to look for something dry for Sakura to wear.

Sakura shook her head, green eyes hollowed.

"Bad things… Bad things…" She covered her ears and pulled at her hair. "No."

Karin paused from her rummaging and stared at her with clinical red eyes. She tilted her head back and allowed a dry smirk to tilt her lips. "Relax."

"He said the world would burn in seven days," Sakura sobbed, limbs shaking.

Karin continued to stare at her, smoke passing through her nose. She looked calm; she looked collected. "I know."

Sakura passed out.

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_Day__**Four**_

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Sakura sat at the corner of a café.

Secluded and hugged by the darkness of the dim lighting.

She was curled into herself, hands fidgeting over her knees as she waited for Ino to show up. This was normal, said the clinical side of her; this was her being unable to cope with the loss of someone close. Someone she _loved_. She was only human, after all. Her limbs shaking, the bags under her eyes, her pale skin, her damp cheeks.

It was normal.

It was all so normal.

Sakura sniffed and made to grab at her ceramic cup of latte, blinking her puffy green eyes.

The bell over the door of the café jingled; someone walked in. Slowly, Sakura looked up in hopes that it'd be Ino.

Her cup slipped from her fingers and shattered to the ground as she stared, wide eyed and completely shocked as Ino walked over. Everyone stopped – like someone pressed the pause button – and turned to look at Sakura and the broken glass and spilled latte. Sakura shook her head, slowly, and stammered. "I—I—sorry!"

The barista that came over to clean the mess smiled at her, sympathetically. "S'okay."

Ino was staring at her with a blank expression, though; blank eyes and brow furrowed and lips contorted into a frown.

"I-Ino," Sakura rasped out, "…you cut your hair…"

The barista left and Ino finished approaching her, fingering the short strands of her blond hair and sitting down at the edge of the curving couch. "I…Yeah… It… I think it's pretty…?"

Sakura nodded, slowly, "But you loved your hair, long…"

"I guess," Ino murmured, sad and lost, "it was time for a change… Things change, right? Things change and then we die."

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Later that day, Ino was dead.

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_Day__**Five**_

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Sakura just didn't know what to do anymore.

Her head pulsed and her throat was dry and her stomach constricted and her limbs shook and her nerves recoiled and she just_ didn't know what to do_.

What was going on?

Ino… Oh, Ino. She was _dead_.

Ino wasn't supposed to be dead; Ino loved life and she was happy and her hair was _short_ when it was supposed to be long. It just… It just… Sakura curled into herself and bit at her arm to keep from sobbing out loud. Her eyes were puffy and red and cheeks were sticky with the dampness of tears that never seemed to stop spilling.

_In seven days, the world is going to burn._

That was a lie, right?

Yes, it… It had to be… It did.

The world couldn't burn.

The world couldn't burn in seven days – that… that was just the hallucination speaking; Sasuke was… was dead when he said that. He didn't know anything. He was gone; he hadn't been part of this world, anymore. He… It was a lie.

It was.

…But then…

Why had Karin known he'd say that?

Sakura clenched her fingers around her hair, pulling and sobbing and—

The door to the spare room Karin had offered her was slammed open. Sakura looked up, staring through the haze of her tears as Karin walked over to her, stiffened and poised to attack. Had Sakura not been too far gone into her self-pity and distress, she would have defended herself as Karin slapped her with force.

"Get a hold of yourself," she spat, tone still managing to be tranquil. "It's disgusting watching you drown in your tears."

Sakura stared at her, lips parted and hand covering the swollen cheek. "I-it's true… Isn't it…"

"Of _course_ it's true," Karin said, waving a hand in the air. She looked as beautiful and confident as ever. She was just like Sasuke in every aspect. "Everything that is ever said, in this world, is true; even lies. The world is going to burn, Sakura. Are you going to do something about it?"

She stared at her, red eyes glinting behind the glass of her glasses and red lips tilted into a smirk. Sakura could only stare at her, completely out of words and mind a numb blob.

Karin leaned towards her, placing her hands on the walls and caging Sakura in. Her lips hovered inches away from the sensitive skin on Sakura's neck as she whispered, voice a sultry hiss, "Are you going to allow the innocent to perish? Aren't you… Driven enough to save them, Sakura?" The smirk on her lips burned at Sakura's skin, causing her to shiver with nostalgia. "Oh, the poor children—"

"STOP IT!"

Sakura pushed her off her person, bolting to her feet and clumsily running towards the door. "STOP IT STOP IT STOP IT STOP IT _STOP IT_."

She could hear Karin's laugh as she ran out of the house, promising something like pain.

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That's when she met Naruto.

She'd fallen, out of exhaustion, right in the middle of a park, lying there without moving and with silent tears spilling from her eyes.

"Uh, h-hey," he asked, hesitant. "Y'okay? I don't think it's normal to be lying around like that, y'know."

Sakura didn't move; she laid there and counted the granite of the park's trail as best as she could. She didn't notice when he picked her up and sat her down on a bench; she caught sunshine blond and sky blue as he crouched down in front of her, but she didn't really say anything. Her head hurt.

"Hey," he said, reaching over and running his thumb across her cheek. "You're bleeding; you sure you're okay? Not that you reassured me when I first asked, but… Look, you're kind of out of it. I can't… leave you here. C'mon, I live across the street. You can chill there til you calm down or something."

He didn't wait for her to say anything; he picked her up and with adding her weight to his, he led her to his house.

Sakura found herself sitting in a small kitchen; it smelt of burnt incense and a little bit of ramen. She stared around, feeling the blood trickle down her cheek and not at all minding it. She dropped her head against the table, staring at the tiled ground with hollow green eyes.

"He died," she whispered, hoarse.

"Whaaa?" He sat down next to her, leaning down to catch her eye. "Who died?"

She wasn't seeing, even with all the staring. "My boyfriend," she breathed out. "He died five days ago."

He looked at her, jawline clenching and the muscle twitching at the strain. His irises dilated as he said, almost strained, "I'm sorry."

"It… was weird, you know," she went on, as if she were talking more to herself rather than someone else. It was as if she had no idea someone else was in the room. Her eyes were trained to the ground, disoriented and puffy from endless tears; her nose was pink and her skin was sickly pale. "H-he walked into my apartment… I don't know how… He was half dead. He was half dead and he walked around it, softly singing his demise.

"It was so beautiful; I heard him singing from my room. His voice was smooth and deep and low; so pretty. Sasuke never sings, but there he was, singing his death march." She turned to spare Naruto a glance, acknowledging his presence for the first time. "Then I saw all the blood; I freaked. I held him, you know. I held him so tight. I felt like I was asphyxiating. The sight of him… Oh, it was so beautiful and gritty and horrible. And I held him.

"And I felt it."

He swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbling in protest. He looked uncomfortable and absolutely freaked; and yet he continued to stand there, by the counters and the sink, staring at her and listening to her speak more to herself than to him.

"I think I completely lost it, then," Sakura ran a very shaky small hand through her knotty hair. "'What happened to your back?' I asked him… I asked him so many times. But he never told me a thing. It's what haunts me, even today. It's… It's what makes me believe him and Karin and… And…"

She went quiet.

Naruto stared, tanned skin growing pale.

"What was it," he questioned, hesitantly.

Sakura lifted her head from the table, shorter strands of her pink hair falling over her face as she turned to give him her full attention.

"Ragged," she whispered, voice raspy. "They were torn out; so, so gruesome."

"_What_," Naruto hissed, shaken.

"Wings."

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_Day__**Six**_

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Naruto became like a silent protector, she soon decided, one night as she curled up at his side.

Like… Like a brother; like Sasuke without all the inexplicable love she'd felt for him.

Sakura never really knew if he believed anything she told him, but he still stuck around no matter how much she'd given him reasons not to. He was a saint of some sort; a saint dressed in anything but white. This could be the only reason why she was not locked inside an asylum with a strait jacket wrapped around her and with needles pricking her skin and pills traveling down her throat ten million times a day.

She sat on the bed – her side; they slept on the same bed but it was completely platonic; she would never allow Naruto to make his pretty girlfriend cry – and hugged her knees, staring at the linoleum ground with a blank stare.

What day was it today?

She didn't quite remember.

Sakura swallowed; her throat was dry and with each swallow felt like she was swallowing sandpaper.

Naruto was in the adjacent bathroom, door wide open as he leant over the sink, staring at the mirror as he brushed his teeth.

There was no noise; no sound; no words. There were never really any words, and Naruto was a chatterbox by default. But when it was just them it was a serene silence that soothed Sakura in all the ways she needed to be soothed. She lay down, curling into herself with her back facing Naruto's side of the bed. She heard him gurgle and spit water out; heard the lights switch off and felt him lay down on the bed.

It was dark.

Sakura was dozing off… She was falling asleep.

She was—

There was a deafening boom.

It felt… It felt – no, it sounded like something was on fire.

Like something was burning into crisp in a matter of milliseconds.

She heard Naruto bolt off, half fall off the bed and even scream in utter confusion.

Was this a dream?

Sakura laid there, utterly motionless.

Was this a dream?

"Wakey, wakey." That was Karin; sultry and hypnotic and oh so tranquil. "Why are we going to bed so early? Fun is only getting started."

Sakura's eyes snapped open and she sat up in bed. The room around her seemed to be on fire; yet they seemed to be controlled to keep them away from the bed that held both Naruto and her. Her breathing began to pick up; her chest rising and falling erratically. Next to her, Naruto seemed to look around with wide blue eyes as he tried to figure out who and what was going on.

And as if to answer him, out of the shadows – out of the flames – came out a woman.

Red and black.

Flaming red hair and matching eyes and black getup. She was still so beautiful, all laced up with death and evil.

Karin placed a hand on her jutted out hip, head tilted back as she stared at them through her glasses. She smirked. "There we go; all nice and awake."

"K-Karin," Sakura whispered, wishing to stand up but so afraid to being engulfed by the flames.

"Hush now, Sakura," Karin said, her eyes glued onto Naruto. "It's not your turn, yet."

Sakura's screams began just as soon as Karin extended an arm towards Naruto and a tremor fell upon the room and, for all Sakura knew, the world.

Karin's full attention was on Naruto; her facial expression poised and blank much like her brother's. A spark seemed to ignite her eyes as Naruto fell to his knees and began to scream in inexplicable pain. And the spark only seemed to spread like wildfire as he thrashed and tried to rip at his chest.

Angry red scratches evolved to gashes and there was blood everywhere.

Sakura continued to scream.

"STOP IT KARIN STOP IT HE'S INNOCENT PLEASE STOP WHAT'RE YOU DOING KARIN _STOP IT_!" She was sobbing and shaking along with the room, wishing to reach towards Naruto but the fire… Oh the fire caged her into the bed and all she could do was watch as Karin tortured and killed him.

Something translucent and red began to come out of Naruto's chest.

Like his soul; like his energy.

It grew in size. It was such an angry color and Naruto's scream only got louder; he was coughing blood and his eyes were red and glassy and he was _dying_ and it was all Sakura's fault.

"PLEASE STOP KARIN," she sobbed, reaching a hand over to Naruto and getting singed by the flames. She cried out, head pulsing and body aching. "HE SAID SEVEN DAYS! HE SAID SEVEN DAYS!"

Karin spared her a glance, the malevolent grin on her lips and her shadowed eyes making her look like death incarnate. "The world was made in six days," she said, fingers curling and arm bending at the elbow as if she were pulling something. "And so it shall start to end on the sixth day." She turned back to Naruto, "And on the seventh, there shall be nothing more."

What was being extracted from Naruto was fully out, only really connected to Naruto's body by a very thin line. It began to take the shape of an enormous, flaming fox with flames as its tail before there was another explosion and everything was red.

Sakura's screams were absorbed and Naruto…

Was dead.

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"_This is perfection, Sakura."_

She groaned.

"_The world exists to be destroyed. It's just a matter of who is able to step up to the plate. Of who is able to succeed."_

Her head hurt.

Where was she?

"_Bodies may fade away and nothing will be saved. And only then would true perfection be able to reign. A world anew. Wouldn't you like that? He would – he wants you there."_

Naruto—

Where…

Her eyes snapped open.

Fire was everywhere.

The world was burning.

The world was _burning_.

Ashes floated in the air and screams of agony drifted back and forth like an echo.

There was the stench of death.

The world was burning.

Sakura stood, tears streaming down her cheeks and sobs wracking at her small frame. She held herself, turning around in place and watching buildings and wildlife set into horrendous undying flames. Black and red flames that couldn't be ceased. People were running away, trying to find shelter. Trying to survive.

Karin materialized before her, the same malevolent look on her face.

"Hello, dear," she whispered, stepping closer towards her. "Welcome. Are you ready?"

"Please stop," Sakura breathed out, sobbing. "Don't do this."

Karin smirked and leant forwards, towards Sakura. "Don't you get it, Sakura? This had been planned since day one; since Sasuke and I moved here. Since we met you. Since you fell in love with him. It was amplified when he fell in love with you. This was going to happen no matter what." She tilted her head to the side and let out a breathy chuckle that tickled Sakura's lips. "Everything was planned; even his death."

"W-what?"

"I killed him," Karin murmured, her eyes locking with Sakura's. "I ripped his wings and killed him. It was the only way for him to unleash Susanoo and get what we've been aiming for."

"What… What is Susanoo," Sakura heard herself ask, through her whimpers.

Karin's lips were against hers, and she mumbled against them, "Well, look."

But the burning world was hidden from her by wings as black as night.

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_Day__**Seven**_

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When the wings spread and gave Sakura the privilege to see, again, the world was still being brought down by merciless flames and over it all stood the darkest image she'd ever seen.

It was shaped like an enormous, never-ending bird – like a phoenix.

Yes.

A phoenix engulfed by flames and giving nothing but chaos and fire and death.

It was as red and black as the rest of the world.

And at its feet stood Sasuke; tall and proud and watching everything with piercing red eyes and a smirk that chilled Sakura to the very marrow of her bones.

Her knees gave out on her and she sunk to the ground. She screamed; for what, she didn't know.

For rage.

For despair.

For sorrow.

For anything.

For everything.

Sasuke turned towards her, his smirk broadening as he began to approach. His attention shifted to something behind where Sakura knelt; to Karin, probably. Nothing was said between them, aloud, but soon Karin was in the air, her elegant black wings forming powerful gusts of wind as she flew higher and faster until she was gone.

Sakura turned to Sasuke, convulsing and outright breaking down into hysteria.

"Sakura," he said, lowly. She could hear him through all the screams and all the crackle of the flames and it hurt how much she'd missed his voice.

She shook her head, grabbing at her hair and pulling. "Stop, Sasuke. Please stop! _Please_! PLEASE!"

He stared at her.

His head tilted and he murmured, "Everything will be alright, soon."

Sakura continued to shake her head and tremble. "Stop it. Please… These people… They… They—"

"Are all gone," Sasuke said, without a hint of remorse. He crouched down in front of her and through the haze of her tears she stared at how ethereal he still was through everything. Pale skin, dark hair and glowing red eyes. "Come now," he said, extending a hand towards her. "Stand up."

Sakura stared at his hand.

"Let's go," he went on. "You'll live to see what we'll create from the ashes of the putrid world we've gotten rid of."

Sakura continued to stare at his hand, tears still spilling.

It went silent between them.

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Trembling and small and oh so very pale.

So small and tiny.

So weak.

Yet she reached over and curled her fingers into his as he took her hand in his.

Karin landed a few feet away from them, a crooked grin on her lips as she sang, over screams and death and cries, "Ashes, ashes we all fall down."


End file.
